Atwater Kent, William Stafford

  

Late nights the world flooded our dark house

in a dim throbbing from a glowing little box, velvety

sound hovering from horns, or Cab Calloway

far in a night club stretched all the way to Kansas.

Maybe rewarded with popcorn or fudge, maybe

just exhausted by the day, we sprawled on the living room

rug and were carried above our house, out

over town, and spread thin by a violin.

Once from Chicago Enio Belognini

civilized with his cello a whole

hemisphere, and we were transformed into Italians

or other great people, listening in palaces.

Rich in our darkness, we lay inheriting

rivers of swirling millions, and the promise of never

a war again. It all came from the sky,

Heaven: London, Rome, Copenhagen.  

https://writersalmanac.publicradio.org/index.php%3Fdate=2004%252F06%252F12.html

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Arthur Atwater Kent Sr. 

 (December 3, 1873 – March 4, 1949) was an American inventor and prominent radio manufacturer 

 based in Philadelphia. In 1921, he patented the modern form of the automobile ignition coil.  

Kent entered Worcester Polytechnic Institute’s freshman mechanical engineering class in the fall of 1895. 

 He was elected treasurer of the class of 1899, but only remained in the position for one semester, because he did not attend recitation classes after the mid-year exams in January. 

 Kent excelled in mechanics and drawing, but was weak in chemistry, algebra, and language, and had no interest in these subjects."

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Hell Recover  

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It was the war to end all warring of the poor on the rich, 

We sold grandmas china next door to Anzac

And watched Captain Sky in our Victorian mansion of Yesterday, 

The violin lessons closeted with the mop.  

I made collage from newspaper fodder about Iraqi Desert Freedom, 

We marched in respectable sweatshop clothes in the city with thousands, palliative, cathartic. 

In the Dalles, the church wanks honked at Grey Panthers on the corner by the post office, surveilled. 

Our daughters rebels at heart, insulted God at Colonel Wright, teacher said, not reciting the Pledge. 

Hell recover. Gitmo pyramids upper right hand corner cover his shame at the incident. 

Father-in-Law, a mortgage interrogator, won Vietnam but not carte blanche to run raids on our home, we watched another movie. 

The river drowns the petroglyphs, she who watches eats popcorn. 

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Nostalgia, invented by Satan in 1911, surplaced Satire as the leading form for dinnerware molds, until Dresden firebombed the allies in 19fortywhatever. Radio raised $75 million dollars for zNistslgia in 1945 when the atom bomb made Satire nap until 1980, when Reagan began Why I Auto banking with Saddam, his Oil Paramour. Finally, Nostalgia for Nazis and Japanese sex dolls won our tiny hearts again around 2010, using purt Bush, Obama, part Clinton and Trump brain segments. It was gloriously continued to re-issue Adam and Eve and the Oligarch Pharaoh Quintet. I hope you enjoy, it's our only station.